Web Resources for COM 3200 (Computer Architecture)

For all course handouts and assignments, please click on the course directory.

Course notes are now available online for:

• caches;
• DDR RAM;
• shared memory; and
• POSIX threads

For the latter part of the course, due to the rapidly evolving nature of the subject, we will rely more on information from the Web, and my own supplementary notes.

CPU Architecture

32-bit CPUs:

• PC Processor Microarchitecture: A Technology Primer and Comparative Analysis (IMPORTANT: To find the article, select the link above. Then select CPUs (under CORE PC TECH), and then select the article with the above name on the Web page.)
  • The Microarchitecture of the PentiumŪ 4 Processor (from Intel Technology Journal)
  • AMD Athlon (32-bit) Processor Microarchitecture
  • Process Development and Manufacturing of High-Performance Microprocessors on 300mm Wafers (Intel Technology Journal)
  • Prefetch in SSE instructions

64-bit CPUs:

• IBM POWER4 System Microarchitecture (from IBM Technical Journals)
• IBM Review of Technology for 157-nm lithography (2001, IBM J. Research and Development)
• Itanium(tm) Processor Family: Tutorials (Intel 64-bit CPU)
  • Understanding the Itanium Architecture (highly recommended)
  • Architecture: Tutorial for Hardware, ...
  • Intel Itanium Processor Microarchitecture
  • Some thoughts of Linus Torvalds (Linux originator): Itanium "threw out all the good parts of the x86"
• The Hammer (64-bit AMD) Microarchitecture
• AMD Opteron (64-bit) from Tom's Hardware Guide

Multi-core chips:

• Current architectures: Intel Pentium 4 ("Hyperthreading" / SMT) as well as the IBM POWER4 and Sun MAJC-5200 (dual-core / CMP) [ Intel has plans for a dual core Itanium (Montecito) and further (Tanglewood); Sun the UltraSPARC IV; and IBM the Power5 ]
• Architecting the Future: Dr. Marc Tremblay (Sun's Roadmap, from Ace's Hardware)

Memory Architecture

Note the detailed specs for the

• Micron 256 Mb (Megabit) DDR RAM chip

Here are some articles on RAM technology.

• Inside RAM: Which Kind is Right for You?
• RAM Technology Primer: CAS Latency
• [H]ard|OCP - DDR
• RAM Guide Part I: DRAM and SRAM Basics
• RAM Guide Part II: Asynchronous and Synchronous DRAM
• RAM Guide Part III: DDR DRAM and RAMBUS

Link to course page on shared memory.

And here are some materials on POSIX threads (including a local copy of the pthread instructions).

• POSIX threads FAQ
• Threads tutorial
• Introduction to Programming Threads (from MIT course)
• POSIX 1c pthread summary (Sun Microsystems, postscript)
• UNIX man pages: Try `apropos pthread', or use `man' in conjunction with above summary.
• Note also the need for `volatile' in C/C++ if you are using variables shared among two or more threads.
• GNU Pth (Portable threads) (use only if your machine doesn't already have threads)

Here are some Web sites on computer architecture that I like:

• The Register (and week's news) (news and rumors on the computer industry; published in Britain)
• The Inquirer (similarly, news and rumors)
• Slashdot: Topics (news and ethical and political issues, with a viewpoint sympathetic to the free software movement)
• Tom's Hardware (excellent survey articles about the latest chip, graphics board, or whatever; published in Germany)
• PC performance from a hobbyist and/or gaming perspective Several of them also discuss overclocking (increasing the clock speed of the CPU beyond the vendor's recommendations)
  • Sharky Extreme
  • Extremetech.com
  • Ars Technica
  • Lost Circuits
  • Anandtech
  • Overclocking (Determining and Testing Stability -- A Beginner's Guide)

If the above interests you, you're also welcome to scan through my C.S. info web page off of my home page. It's basically a bunch of random bookmarks of interest to me, but many of them are concerned with PC technology and/or general computer architecture issues.

Under Construction (This web page will grow with appropriate material as the course progresses.)